


The Beginning

by Ohshitmyship



Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Danny phantom rewrite, Dannypocalypse 2020, Gen, I know I'm hella late but whatever, Pilot Fic, Rewrite, danny phantom - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-21
Updated: 2020-04-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:08:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23761321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ohshitmyship/pseuds/Ohshitmyship
Summary: Jack and Maddie Fenton have finally achieved their life's dream of building a full-scale ghost portal. Only one problem: it doesn't work. One night, Danny has the house to himself and decides to invite his friends over and absolutely no one is prepared for what comes next
Comments: 3
Kudos: 24





	The Beginning

**Author's Note:**

> I know Dannypocalypse was a while ago but I posted this on tumblr the day of and just forgot to post it here bc of reasons

Danny was used to weird shit in his life.

It came with the territory of professional ghost hunting parents. Danny had grown up moving from place to place, his family following the strongest haunting, always in search of potential for a doorway to the other side. 

Five years ago, the Fentons settled down in a small city named Amity Park, declaring that the ectoenergies surrounding the area were exactly what they needed to finally punch a hole through time and space to reach the Ghost Zone.

Danny and his sister Jazz finally settled into their new school, made new friends. The hauntings, oddly enough, kind of stopped aside from the occasional poltergeist. Their parents came up with some explanation, but neither of them listened. They were used to weird shit.

Enough so, that when their parents finally built their dream portal to the Ghost Zone and it failed, Danny brought his friends over to show them. 

It made sense, in all honesty. He only had two real friends; Tucker, who was a tech genius; and Sam, who was a self-proclaimed gothic witch and loved all things ghost.

“This is so  _ cool _ ,” Sam gushed, snapping pictures with a vintage black polaroid, “There’s so much weird energy here.”

“There’s no energy,” Tucker scoffed, poking carefully at the large round tunnel that sat in the basement, which Danny’s parents had converted to a lab.

“There is too,” Sam shot back, “You just don’t feel it.”

“I don’t feel it because nothing’s  _ here. _ This thing is broken.”

“It’s still dangerous though,” Danny warned, zipping into an ectosuit his parents made for their ghost adventures.

“You told us it doesn’t work?” Sam noted, moving towards the mouth of the portal.

“Yeah,I don’t know specifics,” Danny admitted, “Apparently they said they did everything right, calculations and all, but it just...didn’t work. They’ve been troubleshooting all week.”

“This is some complicated stuff,” Tucker said, moving to stand beside Sam at the entrance, “Even I don’t know how they did it.”

“Mom said that it was a combination between ectobiology, computer science, and physics.” Danny stood between the two, everything from the neck down covered in a tight white and black ectosuit. 

“Why do you have that in your exact size?” Sam teased.

Tucker scoffed, “You’ve met Danny’s parents, right? They have an ectosuit for each of their kids. Probably have some for us too.”

“We should put them on and go in too!” Sam suggested.

“No,” Danny said, quite firm, “I shouldn’t even really have you guys down here. If we all go in and something happens, my parents are going to  _ kill  _ me.”

“Yeah I don’t really wanna go in all that bad,” Tucker admitted, “I know your parents have like, seven PhDs between them, but this does not look safe at all.”

Danny sighed, tugging on the edges of the gloves nervously, “Okay so I get in there, you take a couple of pictures, and we’re done.”

“Why are you using that thing anyways?” Tucker asked, gesturing to Sam’s polaroid, “It doesn’t even take good photos.”

“Everyone knows that polaroids are better for ghost activity,” Sam replied.

“Yeah, Tuck,” Danny added, “Everyone knows that.”

“Shut up and get in,” Sam said, smacking his arm playfully.

“That’s what she said.”

“Tucker!”

“Sorry.”

Danny sighed and stepped forward, his foot hitting the metal panelling. 

Nothing happened.

He stepped inside fully, turning around to smile at the two as Sam snapped a photo.

“So far so good.”

Danny turned back around and made his way through the tunnel. It was about ten feet long and seven feet in diameter, all shimmery steel and green wires. There were some buttons but Danny didn’t really think about them too much, his parents had already spent countless hours inside the thing.

It was strange, being inside of the tunnel. It felt as though everything was muted, he felt lighter, his strides perhaps a bit longer than they had been before. 

When he finally reached the end, he turned around again. The tunnel seemed far longer somehow, Sam and Tucker too small to only be ten feet away. His head was heavy and he heard a light rushing sound in his ears, like someone was playing ocean noises in another room.

“This is so cool!” Sam’s voice called, echoing slightly through the tunnel. Danny could see her camera flash.

Danny stood there for a little, looking around him at the panelled walls. He knew a decent amount about physics, but aside from that he was lost – he was a space sorta guy, not a ghost hunter.

When Danny’s head started to hurt, he decided to make his way back out. His parents didn’t mind them checking out the ghost portal, so long as they didn’t mess around too much. Jack and Maddie Fenton had put them all in ectosuits and walked them through the portal, explaining what each button did. Danny didn’t pay any attention. He rarely did, to be quite honest. 

The tunnel seemed to be playing tricks on his mind, because it seemed to get longer with each step he took. He dragged his right hand along the wall, using it for support as his headache began to worsen. He wondered what the hell was going on, he had never felt like this in the portal before, why now was he suddenly feeling so strange?

Maybe he was coming down with a cold – that might explain it.

And then everything happened at once, but it happened in slow motion.

Danny saw Sam’s camera flash go off, but it lasted far too long. His hand brushed against a button –  _ green _ , some small part of his brain registered – and pushed it by accident. Sam’s eternal flash was suddenly lost in a wave of green as he felt a shock lace through his body, starting at his hand and travelling throughout his whole body.

It was...strange. 

A memory was brought to Danny’s mind, a rather old memory. He was maybe five or six and they were playing around on their aunt’s farm. One of the farm hands, Danny forgot his name, had jokingly dared him to touch the electric fence. He had, and of course he’d been met with a sharp jolt of pain. 

This sensation was similar to that, but a thousand times stronger, and it didn’t stop. When Danny removed his hand from the fence, the pain had gone away immediately, leaving only a small tingling sensation. 

His whole body felt like that, as if each vein was filled with electricity rather than blood.

He had never been in so much pain in his entire life, which was probably about to end.

Danny could only see green, feel pain, taste metal, smell the scent of something burning, hear a distant scream. Was it him, or his friends? He couldn’t tell.

“ _ It is time. _ ”

The voice seemed to be coming from deep inside him, but all around him at once. It was a low voice, a baritone. Through the intense and never ending pain, Danny felt something cold in his gut.

_ I don’t want to die. _

“ _ Few ever do. But you are not going to die just yet, Danny Phantom. This is not the end, but the beginning.” _

And then everything went black and the pain finally,  _ finally  _ stopped.

* * *

“Danny! Danny! Tuck, I think he’s waking up!”

“Danny, c’mon man, open your eyes!”

As if obeying the command, Danny’s eyes snapped open and he sat bolt upright, gasping for air.

“Danny!”

He looked up to see Sam and Tucker on either side of him, tears staining both of their faces, Sam’s eyeliner had made little trails down her face.

“Wha–what happened?”

His voice cracked and his throat was dry, as if he hadn’t spoken in years.

“We don’t know,” Sam babbled, not bothering to wipe her eyes, “Danny you were just in there and suddenly there was this bright green light and the portal turned on and, and –”

“And then you just stumbled out!” Tucker continued, in no better shape, “You were smoking and  _ glowing _ .”

“Glowing?” Danny brought a hand to his head, rubbing at his forehead. He noticed that the glove was white, not black like it used to be.

Then the sinking feeling was back and he struggled to his feet.

“Danny, no!” Sam argued, trying to pull him back down.

“You were in there when it was activated!” Tucker grabbed his other hand.

His hands tingled for a moment and then they were free.

He stumbled his way to the basement bathroom, for the mirror that he knew was above the sink.

Danny doesn’t recognize the person in front of him. 

Well, the face itself was the same, but everything else seemed to be reversed. His hair, which used to be inky black like his dad’s, was now a pure white, even his eyebrows had changed. His skin used to be somewhat tanned, but he was pale enough to look like a corpse.

His ectosuit was reversed too – the body of it used to be white with the boots, gloves, and neck black. Now, it was the opposite. But that wasn’t the weirdest – no, the weirdest was his  _ eyes.  _ They used to be a soft blue, like his mom’s, but now they were bright neon green, they even  _ glowed  _ in the dark light of the bathroom.

“I’m...a  _ ghost. _ ”

Danny felt his knees buckle and he slid down, his back hitting the door as he slumped on the floor.

“Danny….”

He felt a warm hand on his shoulder and looked up to see Sam kneeling next to him, Tucker beside her.

He could tell that they wanted to say something, but he knew that no one had any idea as to what to say. What did you tell your best friend who just died and returned as a ghost before your very eyes?

Instead, Danny began to cry. How could he not? He died.

He  _ died. _

Sam and Tucker weren’t far behind him. They both dropped to their knees to hug Danny on the bathroom floor, tears flowing freely from their cheeks. The only sounds to fill the basement were soft sobs and sniffling.

Danny didn’t know how long they were sitting there, sobbing on the bathroom floor. But eventually, Danny began to calm down. _Maybe this isn’t so bad_ , a small part of him tried, _Maybe we can work with this. Mom and Dad will have a field day._ _Jazz will get to learn the psychology of a ghost, that’s kinda cool I guess._

As the tears began to slow and Danny was able to catch his breath, something strange happened. Danny had his eyes closed, but the flash of light turned his eyelids red and he heard Sam and Tucker gasp.

He felt...warmer. Danny suddenly noticed how cold the bathroom floor was, how sore he felt.

When he opened his eyes, Sam and Tucker were staring at him in awe. He took a breath and felt it fill his lungs. He raised a hand to his neck and felt his pulse. Slowly, he stood up to see his reflection back to normal. Maybe a little paler than before, his hair wild, but he looked like his old self. He looked  _ alive. _

Sam and Tucker still knelt on the floor, staring up at him silently. He knew they were all thinking the same thing:  _ had they imagined the whole thing _ ?

Danny poked his head out of the bathroom. The entrance of the portal was a bright neon green, shimmering like water in sunlight. He went back into the bathroom, holding his hands out for Sam and Tucker.

They both took them, or at least tried to. Their hands passed right through Danny’s, as if he were a hologram.

“Okay,” Tucker finally spoke, “This is getting weird.”

“Getting?” Danny scoffed, trying for some light humour, “We’re way past weird.”

Sam and Tucker stood up on their own, and Danny unzipped the ectosuit covering his regular clothes.

The three of them walked out of the bathroom, Sam and Tucker sitting on the old couch in the corner while Danny paced in front of them.

“What happened after I… passed out?”

“Well there was a great big flash,” Tucker began, “Then the portal turned on and you stumbled out, then you collapsed.”

“We checked your pulse but we couldn’t find it,” Sam added nervously, “You were so cold.”

“Did you call anyone?”  
Sam and Tucker glanced at each other nervously.

“We didn’t know who to call,” Sam finally said, “We thought about calling an ambulance, but it was pretty obvious something ghost-like had happened.”

“We were about to call your parents, but then you woke up.”

“So we’re the only ones that know this happened?”

Sam and Tucker nodded.

“Okay.”

“What….happened?” Tucker asked after a minute.

“ _ Tuck! _ ” Sam hissed.

“What?” Tucker demanded, “We saw it! Why shouldn’t we ask about it?”

“It’s alright,” Danny assured, stopping his pacing and sighing, “It all happened pretty fast. I just remember Sam taking a photo, then pressing a button by accident, I think I was electrocuted, everything went green, I heard a voice then...then everything went black.”

“A voice?” Tucker asked.

“Like, the Grim Reaper?” Sam asked.

“I don’t think so,” Danny said, trying to remember, “I think it was a man’s voice, it was really deep. He said something like ‘you’re not going to die just yet, Danny Phantom. This is just the beginning’.”

“Wait, Danny  _ Phantom _ ?” Tucker asked, “You sure he didn’t say Fenton?”

“No, I’m sure,” Danny said, “He definitely said Phantom.”

“But he said it was the beginning of something?” Sam asked.

Danny nodded, “Yeah, not the end, but the beginning. No idea what he meant though.”

“Maybe it’s like the tarot card, Death,” Sam suggested, “Like, it means a transformation. Something ends so that something else can begin.”

“That’s all well and good,” Tucker said, “But what does it  _ mean _ ?”

“I wish I knew.” Danny sighed again and rubbed his eyes, “I’m sorry guys, I’m really tired.”

“Don’t apologize,” Sam said, standing up to lay a hand on Danny’s shoulder.

“Yeah,” Tucker added, “I mean, you did get electrocuted in a portal to the afterlife, so I think you’re allowed to be a little tired.”

The three of them laughed, but the laughs were preceded by so many tears that they sounded almost forced.

Danny led his friends out and they promised to call him once they got home. He waved to them as they walked away and sighed when he closed the door.

He was glad no one was home, because he was sure that someone would’ve heard him scream. Danny wandered back downstairs to put everything away. 

“Wonder what I’ll tell my parents,” he said to himself as he folded up the ectosuit to put back in the wardrobe, “Maybe I’ll tell them it just...came on.” Danny groaned, “That’s no good. Maybe I’ll say there was an electrical surge and it turned on. Yeah, that makes sense.”

He put the ectosuit away and began to pick up the photos littered across the lab floor. Sam would probably want them so he didn’t throw them out, but he didn’t look too closely at them.

Until he found the last photo that Sam took.

It was the same one that had flashed just as he pressed the button and it was...kind of haunting.

The photo was all kinds of distorted, even the white edges tinged a sickly green. In the centre was Danny, his arm touching the edge, his body looking to be in the middle of a convulsion. It was hard to tell with the distortion, but it looked as though there was a ring of white light around his chest and waist. He looked like he had as a ghost, but in the middle part, in between the two lights, his suit looked like it had before.

Danny was about to put the photo away, slightly disturbed that Sam had managed to catch the exact moment of his not-death, but something else caught his eye.

There were two shadows in the background, blurry and pixelated at the same time. One shadow looked humanoid, while the other looked like a blob with a head and arms holding onto something long. He wondered if the shadows belonged to whatever had spoken to him while he was in the portal.

Danny shook his head. There was nothing he could do at the moment, and he was too exhausted to think properly. The only thing he wanted to think about was his warm bed – he wanted to get in it and sleep for a very, very long time.

Danny gathered all of the photos and took them upstairs. Mechanically, he got ready for bed. He didn’t remember brushing his teeth or putting his pajamas on, but when he climbed into bed, his breath was minty and he was changed.

Danny was worried that sleep wouldn’t take him, but he could already feel the darkness settling in, far calmer than the darkness before.

As he drifted off to sleep, Danny mulled over the words from the mysterious figure. Two words in particular held firm in his mind.

_ Danny Phantom. _


End file.
